Brief Threat to Sue Gay Blog at Patrick Henry College

Submitted by Libby A. Nelson on December 4, 2012 - 3:00am

The chancellor of Patrick Henry College, an evangelical Christian college in Virginia, briefly threatened legal action against authors of Queer Patrick Henry College[1], a blog about being gay at the institution, over their use of the college's name. In a Facebook message, Michael Farris, the college's president, said he would take legal action against Facebook to force the group to change its name because it violated the college's copyright. After the blog's authors, three anonymous students at Patrick Henry, posted about the threat, Farris rescinded it in a Facebook comment.

Franciscan University of Steubenville, a conservative Roman Catholic college in Ohio, made a similar legal threat[2] over name use against a group of gay alumni earlier this year.